Polar Drops
by BlueFoxofWater1569
Summary: An innocent dream can so easily turn into a nightmare. Soubi/Ritsuka Oneshot


Sum: An innocent dream can so easily turn into a nightmare. Soubi/Ritsuka Oneshot

Intro: I got this idea sometime around the middle of the night after having a personal experience like this happening to me. Word of advice: Never tromp through knee-height snow when you're in a hurry. (shivers) I wrote this during Biology, so forgive if it seems a bit…dry.

I'm also going off other people's descriptions of Ritsuka's eye color, because I only own the manga, and his eyes and hair changes with every cover… (sighs) This takes place during volume 5 of the manga, directly after Ritsuka's dream of Seimei, but before he wakes up in Soubi's house.

WARNING: This oneshot contains yaoi. If you don't like it, then please leave, because the rest of us think it's cute. (beams)

Disclaimer: Dood, _fan_fiction.

****

~Polar Drops~  
~By BlueFox~

__

What is white…?

Snow is white.

__

What is snow…?

Something that is white.

-.-.-

The dream started off nicely. Ritsuka Aoyagi was used to having vivid dreams, usually of his brother, Seimei. That last one had been very frightening, darkness enveloping Seimei, who was getting further and further from Ritsuka's grasp.

The last dream had been hot, but this one…this one was cold. Ritsuka blinked his violet eyes at the sudden drastic change in scenery, from dark, to painfully bright. Snow glistened in all direction he looked, as far as he could see. It was in the blanket form, beautiful, just fallen. No footprints had broken the smooth texture, no snow drifts had been formed by a wind, it looked absolutely beautiful.

But it was also very quiet. Eerily quiet.

Wondering what the point of the dream was, Ritsuka lifted a foot to step forward. His foot sank in about as high as his knee, and he was very glad he had worn snowboots in this dream.

When did he know to wear snowboots? Ah, it didn't matter. He was wearing winter clothes, he felt warm, so what was the difference?

Ritsuka began to trudge through the endless amount of perfect snow, wondering when he'd wake up, what would happen before he woke up. It was odd, to know you're in a dream and be musing about waking up in the middle of it. The quiet was getting to him, despite being broken by the sound of his feet breaking through the frozen top into the small flakes that had built up beneath it. He reached over and pinched himself, half-expecting it to not work.

He was right.

Just an old wives' tale, he supposed, pinching yourself would wake you up from a dream. No, because in the vivid nightmares full of fire and screams, pinching yourself could not wake you up from it, could not even distract you from the fear-inducing images your subconscious sets before you. And sometimes… it's not the subconscious that does it. Sometimes, those images are real. And pinching yourself will never take you away from reality. Never can, never will.

But already Ritsuka was getting a bit tired of this endless white, and when he glanced back to see how far he had tread, he saw that there was no path of his own footprints he could see. Not a one he saw, it was still that perfect, endless white. However, the neko would not believe it, he couldn't believe it. He knew he hadn't been walking in place, or had he? He didn't feel winded, so maybe he had been? Speaking of which…

Ritsuka blew out of his mouth, and no cloud of his breath appeared. That bothered him, for his face felt just a little bit cold, so it would have to be cold enough to see your breath, right?

Of course, this was a dream, but it was an eerie one at that. And if it was Ritsuka's dream, shouldn't he be able to make what he wanted happen, well, happen? Ritsuka closed his eyes, and thought, _I want it to be cold enough to see my breath._

So when he opened his eyes and blew out his breath, he was pleased to see it cloud around him. He was not pleased, however, when a chill passed through his clothing and caressed its way down his back and to the tip of his ebony tail, which twitched in discomfort. His ears laid back against his head as goosebumps rolled up and down his arms from a cold breeze that blew.

__

Wind chill, that's great,

he thought sarcastically, and in response to his thoughts, the wind picked up, tearing at his clothes and hair. His cat ears pressed even closer to the top of his head as he wrapped his arms around him and rubbed. "It won't stop, will it?" he murmured to the wind, and he was right; it didn't stop, it just seemed to get worse.

So, Ritsuka could not wake up from this dream of snow, quickly becoming a blizzard, and he could not make it stop. The only thing he realized he could do was trudge onward, until his body deemed it time to wake up. So he lifted up a booted foot and stepped through the next part of the snow. This time, however, he didn't sink. Looking down, he saw that he was standing on what looked like tire marks, created a path of ice in some unknown direction.

Was this the point of the dream? Maybe, he was supposed to follow the tire marks?

After staring at the slowly disappearing tire marks for so long his eyes began to water, Ritsuka drew up the other leg he had left buried in the snow and stepped onto the tire tracks. When he glanced back, his footprints that should've been in the snow were already gone. And despite half-knowing they would be, it still made his heart skip a beat or two, until he finally averted his purple orbs and began to follow the tire tracks.

However, after an unknown amount of time, Ritsuka started to see something other than the endless perfect snow.

-.-.-

__

What is red…?

Blood is red.

__

What is blood…?

Something that is not white.

-.-.-

Ritsuka literally froze in his tracks in the snow, staring mutely at the light red snow laid out in a trail in front of him. The sight of it actually caught his breath for little more than a minute and a half straight, before he realized all he heard was his heart beating a little erratically in tempo and let out his breath. He didn't like the sight of this.

Who's blood was it? It wasn't his, he had been with himself the entire time, and he wasn't that far ahead, to wherever this trail of blood colored snow led. Or maybe he was back where he started, and had been bleeding and didn't know it? Slowly, he cast a glance over his shoulder, and was relieved to see the perfect white behind him. Turning back, he was a little frightened to see the blood-snow still there. Now he felt his heart picking up speed a little bit more, and he forced himself to breath normally. _Make the blood go away,_ he thought, with his eyes closed.

When he opened them, he let out a small yelp and took a few stumbling steps back.

It was still there, but darker, fresher, brand new. "That's not making it go away!" he called angrily and shakily to the wind, which only picked up more and almost knocked him off his feet into the snow surrounding the bloody tire tracks.

He knew it wasn't his blood. But who's was it? Could it be…Seimei's? No, no, Seimei hadn't died in the snow, it had been in the elementary school, surrounded by fire, tied to a chair… Ritsuka roughly shook his head to throw away the images, lest they form themselves in this dream, and make it worse than it already was.

Maybe, it was…Soubi's?

That thought struck a cord somewhere deep in Ritsuka, and he felt raw fear envelop him. His ears pressed back against his head so hard he actually gave a wince, and his tail began to lash out around him, just like a cat who was fed up with a dog that wouldn't stop pestering it. However, that was not what Ritsuka was feeling. instead, he felt…he didn't know what he felt. Of course, there was fear, surrounding his thoughts and tinting them black with its darkness, but there was something else. It felt like the fear that was consuming him, but it wasn't it. It was fear and more, something much more.

Despite the biting winds, Ritsuka felt a sweat break out on him, and he reached up and threw off the gloves. It was the only explanation, the blood on the snow was Soubi's, it couldn't bee anyone else's. Throwing off the heavy jacket he had found himself in, he moved toward the trail of blood in the snow, and unknowingly stepped off the tire marks, and into the knee deep snow again. He lost his balance for a moment, and his inertia almost knocked him face first into the snow, if he hadn't been quick to catch his balance. Standing straight, he found the trail again and began to trudge through the snow, with more speed and vigor than before.

However, the vigor soon ran out into pure panic, when he saw a figure laying in the snow a few yards ahead of him. The blond hair easily gave it away, and he had been right. Soubi lay face down, a small patch of snow having melted away at his body heat, but the ground beneath him was covered in his blood. Ritsuka felt his heart jump into his throat, and tried to run toward Soubi, but the snow severely limited his speed.

"Soubi, no, no, oh no," he said to himself, and about halfway to Soubi, he had to stop. His breaths were coming in deep, short, uncontrolled bursts, and he realized he was hyperventilating. "S-Soubi," he gasped, and tried to take another step, but found himself unable to, as his body weight almost overpowered him and he nearly had his face meet with the snow he was trying to climb through to get to his fighter. Tears pricked at his eyes, and the hyperventilation was mixed with dry sobs, for the tears refused to fall.

Heart and blood roaring in his ears, Ritsuka tried again to take another step toward Soubi, but this time ended up face down in the knee deep snow. Above him, the sun that had been out and shining off the snow turned dark, and he slowly raised his cold, polar drop covered face to the sky, and dark clouds hung over him, foretelling certain doom. Ritsuka, now covered in snow, dream-created or not, felt a spear of ice stab into his heart and spread out through his body, and he began to shiver.

He turned his purple eyes back to where Soubi lay, motionless, the blood around him encompassing an even larger area. Ritsuka tried to push himself to his feet, but the cold numbed him, and had no sense of what he was doing. He saw himself raise his hand again, the hyperventilation becoming so bad, his vision began to swirl and sway around him, the only clear thing being Soubi. "I can't," he whispered through his quick and deep breaths. "I can't…make it. Soubi…!"

-.-.-

__

What does snow become when it melts?

Spring.

-.-.-

"Ooh, 19 chain reaction!" Natsuo softly exclaimed, playing his hand held game. Soubi briefly looked up at the boy from his book, as if interested, but then returned his eyes to the book he held in his hands. Yoji was dozing on the table, and thus did not hear his partner's exclamation.

There was a gasp from the Zero's bed, and Ritsuka sat up very quickly, covered in a cold sweat, breaths coming in pants, his black ears laying down, his eyes averted to the blanket, as if wondering where it came from. Soubi looked surprised and worried at the same time as he looked at his sacrifice put a hand on his face and clench the blankets beneath him weakly.

"Ritsuka?" he asked softly, and the cat ears twitched at his name as he slowly got his breathing under control.

"I had a bad dream…" he murmured his explanation, remembering Soubi's unconscious-possibly-dead body laying in his own blood. He suppressed a shudder. Soubi's chair legs scraped slightly against the floor at he got to his feet.

"Are you all right?" the fighter asked, stretching out and laying a gentle hand on Ritsuka's trembling shoulder.

"Nnn…" was Ritsuka's answer, and Soubi knew something was wrong when Ritsuka didn't shake off his hand at all.

"And what are you doing here?" came Yoji's voice, for the fighter was now wide awake.

Ritsuka's violet eye opened, yet he only stared dazedly in front of him, fully aware that Soubi's hand was on his shoulder, and that the snow scene had been a dream. He took comfort from knowing Beloved's fighter, his fighter, was still alive, and didn't want to shake that little comfort away. "The door was open…" he finally answered Yoji.

"That's not what I'm talking about! Why are you sleeping here?"

Finally, Ritsuka drew his eye up, still hiding one behind his hand, and looked at Yoji. Soubi's hand left his shoulder, and he suppressed a shudder, discreetly watching the blond make his way to a small refrigerator and pull something out. It turned out to be a water bottle. "Because tonight," he started to answer, and his and Soubi's eyes met, and something flickered in Soubi's eyes, but he couldn't see or realize what, "I need to stay awake." _I don't want to see that again_, he thought, and finally averted his eyes away from Soubi, but not before noticing Soubi's eyes register the look of fear and worry-yes, that's what he had been feeling in the dream-in those deep purple depths.

"You were in our bed!!" exclaimed Natsuo.

"I had nowhere else to sleep," came Ritsuka's answer as Soubi came back to Ritsuka.

"You could have used Soubi's bed," pointed out Yoji.

"It stinks like Soubi, so no thanks," Ritsuka joked softly, trying at a smile but failing. That dream still conquered his thoughts, and he barely realized it when Soubi extended his hand holding a cold waterbottle to him.

"Ritsuka." Soubi's voice broke through his muddled and still scared, panicked, worried mind, and he looked up, fully into the eyes of Soubi, who wasn't bleeding, wasn't dead, was very much alive and in front of him. Mutely, he reached up and took the waterbottle, unknowingly taking Soubi's fingers as well, and they sort of stayed like that, just staring at each other with fingers twined. "You're pulling an all-nighter?" Soubi finally asked, and released the waterbottle with a small, "I stink?"

Ritsuka looked down at the cold waterbottle and shivered at it. He didn't need anything cold now, he was still cold from his dream. But despite that, he still opened it and took a small sip. "Yeah," he answered, though to which question Soubi had posed no one knew; not even Ritsuka. "Tonight I'm going to play Wisdom Resurrection." He slowly twisted the cap on the waterbottle. "I'm going to get close to Septimal Moon." He pressed his forehead to the closed cap of the waterbottle and shivered again. Soubi kneeled beside him and placed that large, warm, comforting hand on his shoulder again, and Ritsuka almost sobbed in happiness, knowing Soubi was still alive, still a part of his life, still there to be the one thing to brighten his day. "I'm not going home tonight."

Natsuo blinked, laying his arm on a drawn up knee. "What about your parents?" he asked.

"My mother's a shut-in," Ritsuka softly explained and Soubi closed his eyes. "she hardly leaves her room, let alone the house. She won't even notice…" Ritsuka felt a tear slowly slide down his cheek, but before he could reach up to wipe it, Soubi's long fingers did it for him. "That I'm gone."

****

~Polar Drops~  
~End~

Sorry if you guys were expecting a "Suki dayo" or something of that sort out of this oneshot. Although he hasn't realized it, Ritsuka has just found that wonderful emotion called 'love' via this nightmare, but I didn't want to expand more than I already had on the manga, so my apologies there.

Criticism is crucial! I'll be the first to admit that yaoi can sometimes be lacking. So, drop me a review and please tell me how it was! And as for the little interludes about snow, the first two were from Vampire Knight (that kind of inspired the whole beginning of this oneshot) and the third was from the Fruits Basket anime. So now ya know! ^-^ Anyway, I'm off to continue my story over in VK! (runs off)


End file.
